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Can Canadians Travel to Get the COVID-19 Vaccine?
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I find it hilarious that you see nothing wrong ethically just because it’s possible to do it. That’s not ethics. Ethically this is a gross exercise of privilege for the sake of waiting a few weeks. Man up- abide by restrictions like everyone else. If everyone did this the virus would be circulating more than it is now. That’s the ethics of it.
You could also make the case that it’d be a wise exercise of privilege in the battle of vaccines vs. variants; given the state of the vaccine oversupply in the US, if everyone did this the virus would be under a lot more control than it is now under the poorly coordinated and poorly enforced policies up here in Canada.
Of course, because ultimately only a few Canadians will choose this route, I don’t believe it’s in the best interest of every Canadian to do so – but I don’t view the ethical debate as a single-faceted one.
If everyone. did this the virus would most certainly not be under a lot more control. There are low numbers of infection associated with travel currently because not that many people are doing it. Again- what is this logic- you state because ultimately a few Canadians will choose this route – it’s not in the best interests of every Canadian to do so? What does that even mean? It’s not in the best interests of humanity to do this and that’s the end of the debate from an ethical perspective.
Well, what it means is outlined in the article. In concrete terms, travel restrictions and 3-day hotel / 14-day home quarantines make it quite burdensome for many Canadians to travel for the vaccine, and therefore easier and more straightforward to wait it out a few more weeks.
But if we’re opening it up to the question of “what would happen if everyone did this”, if everyone got vaccinated, the virus would certainly be under a lot more control. And if we’re talking about the “best interests of humanity”, it’s certainly in the best interests of humanity to be vaccinated as early on as possible.
The practicality of the matter (or lack thereof) is as clear-cut as you suggest. The ethics aren’t necessarily so.
What you are missing is any empirical evidence that if everyone travelled to get vaccine – that would not cause increased incidence of virus.
I did exactly that last week – however, I am already going to the US every few weeks for an essential medical treatment, so I am quarantine exempt (finally! It didn’t use to be – at one point I was on 5 quarantines at the same time!).
I booked my J&J shot in Erie, PA. Pennsylvania is vaccinating non-residents and I qualified. Nobody asked any questions. They actually said in the booking that you did not need to provide ID to get the vaccine.
I got my shot 2 days after my father died of Covid in Brazil. I literally cried when I parked outside the pharmacy.
Now, with the 2 shot vaccines I think it is just too much hassle if you are not test/quarantine exempt.
Given that here in Canada you are now waiting 4 months for the second shot, very few will be vaccinated by summer. Lots of people will have a single dose but the manufacturers (and the government of Canada website) still say 21 days until your second shot.
How effective will that second shot be that much later?
My thoughts are to get the first shot in Canada then potentially get my second shot in the USA to keep to the recommended schedule.
Just today, USA announced USA will halt J&J (Johnson & Johnson) due to the possible links to blood clot (just like AstraZenica). So anyone who try to go south to get the JnJ shot will have to reconsider: First, would the blood clot issue border you? And, how soon will the J&J to be resumed in USA? Otherwise, to get the Pfizer or Moderna shot in USA, you have to wait for 4 weeks in between. That means you either spend 4 weeks in a hotel or unless you know someone who would shelter you in the State you want to get the shot… but who will? It is a high risk venture…. I think better just wait for the vaccine in Canada, likely within a month and a half, most adult Canadians would be able to get the first shot. In the meantime, just play safe: mask up, social distance, no gatherings, no travel….God bless Canadians….
The incidence rates of blood clots is low, 6 cases in 6.8 million shots. So 0.88 blood clots per million shots given. Commercial aviation had a death rate of 0.27 fatal accidents per million flights. If you need to fly 4 flight segments to get the vaccine, your odds of dying in an aviation accident is higher (0.000088% chance of a blood clot, 0.00011% chance of a fatal aviation accident).
With J&J having a major drop in supply and the temporary hold on distribution (although I guess manufacturing can catch up while they’re not distributing), that’s probably the bigger issue.
That being said, it raises the question of health insurance while being vaccinated. Most (if not all) policies won’t cover trips made for the purpose of medical treatment nor any experimental or elective treatments and consequences.
Please note that being vaccinated does not mean you can forego the indoor masking and other requirements. I got my first shot in Canada last week, and was provided a guideline with instructions to continue the current safety practice.
Let me point you to this Reddit thread explaining how US citizens living in BC can get a same-day COVID vaccination in Washington state:
https://www.reddit.com/r/vancouver/comments/mmbwm6/fellow_americans_you_can_get_your_covid19_vaccine/
No need to fly, stay at a quarantine hotel, or even spend more than 10 – 12 hours outside of Canada.
Another 8 weeks, worst case. Most likely will be sooner. No rush to go abroad for it since being vaccinated doesn’t exempt you from anything in Canada, for the time being.
This is all assuming that the actual reported information is accurate about vaccines. If you actually look at the clinical trial results for example for moderna and Pfizer the vaccines only did 1% better than the placebo groups. The quoted 95% rate was just compared to itself not to the control group.
This is absolutely false. The first shot of mRNA vaccine is 22 times more effective than placebo. Some of the data, however, was corrupted because the placebo group participants went to their local clinic to get the actual vaccine DURING the trial. It resulted in both placebo and vaccine group participants getting inoculated.
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/02/19/969143015/long-term-studies-of-covid-19-vaccines-hurt-by-placebo-recipients-getting-immuni
https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-detail/pfizer-and-biontech-conclude-phase-3-study-covid-19-vaccine
That’s simply not true. I suggest you consult an accredited source. This whole discussion is a bit odd. Of course we are all fed up being in the same place – but the regulations on travel are there for a reason. What if you go to the US, get vaccinated but pick up Covid before the vaccination kicks in – or worse – pick up one of the variants instead that is happily looking for a way to kill more people. Suck it up people and save yourselves for fabulous travel when it’s safe to do so.
What Jim said isn’t quite right but is closer to the truth than mainstream media would have you believe this is taken directly from FDA report on trials:
“In a mid-November analysis of 36,621 participants randomized 1:1 to vaccine or placebo who were included in the per-protocol efficacy analysis population of participants without evidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection prior to 7 days after completion of the vaccination regimen, efficacy in preventing confirmed COVID-19 occurring at least 7 days after the second dose of vaccine was 95.0%, with 8 COVID-19 cases in the vaccine group and 162 COVID-19 cases in the placebo group.”
Where the 95% comes from is from dividing the covid case in the vaccine group by the amount in the control group 8/(162+8) = 0.95. However if you look at each groups infection rate its 8/18310=0.0004=0.04% for the vaccine group and 162/1831=0.0088=0.88% which is a difference of 0.84% or approximately 1%. In other words the vaccine showed you were 99.96% safe while placebo 99.12%.
Link to FDA Document: https://www.fda.gov/media/144245/download
Ricky, to which COVID vaccine(s) will you have access while visiting China? The SinoVac vaccine is only about 50% effective.
I’ll probably try to get the Sinopharm, which was 70–80% last I checked and has been taken by a few of my friends in the UAE with no issues.
If I make it to Hong Kong, I might be able to get the first dose of Pfizer there too.
Sinopharm claims 79% efficacy but has not released any data. I’d be very skeptical about this claim.
I do share the skepticism, which is why I’ll probably look to get an mRNA vaccine as well in the future. For now, any vaccine is better than none.
A couple of small quibbles – I believe you need a PCR test to get on a plane to the US – that does cost money. My parents just came back to Canada from the US – and getting a covid test there wasn’t as easy as you described – they ended up paying around $200 US each for the test that would allow them entry to Canada. I had a similar issue in Arizona.
And I’ll just rail on the practicality of all of this – Instead of flying Air Canada home – they paid a US airline to fly to Buffalo. Air Canada desperately needs that business – the Liberals policy around hotel stays really hurts them. Keeping in mind they’ve had both vaccines, they paid several hundred dollars for tests, again, paid a US airline, and then paid $300 US to a limo company out of Buffalo. They also took another test at the border, and take another test in Canada in ten days. This is complete insanity. A waste of their money, costly to Air Canada, and costly to the taxpayer.
You don’t necessarily need to do a PCR test to fly to the US, they’ll accept an antigen test as well. As an example, last I checked, YYZ was giving out free antigen testing for travel to the US (in exchange for your personal data).
Did they fly back or cross by land? My comment about the availability of free tests was specific to the border towns, based on Andrew’s article.
Most Canadians would probably share your concerns about practicality, which is why I don’t think it’s necessarily a solution that has mass appeal.
ricky, i may be completely wrong about this but i understood that it was illegal for a canadian citizen to drive a car with US registration into canada and that this includes rental cars.
this could be just internet lore or could have been true in the past. what do you know about it?
In my experience, no issues. Rental agencies may have their own rules about rentals (one way or return) going between countries, but I don’t believe CBSA / OPP / local police have any issues. Rental agencies sometimes rent foreign plated vehicles out in Canada anyways.
When I drove a one-way FL plated rental into Canada, the CBSA did ask if the car was mine. I said it was a rental and there was no further discussion about that.
I’m not completely familiar, but it seems like this may have been true in the past but was temporarily lifted during the pandemic. This aligns with the experiences of many Canadian travellers who have returned to the country with one-way car rentals or U-Hauls over the past few months to sidestep the hotel quarantine measures.
Last I checked – the rental car companies had made it very difficult to rent a car in Buffalo or Detroit and return it to Pearson – It was a two day minimum when I did it. Recently I noticed a three day minimum – and it may not still be available – they also jack the rated – it was $160 per day when I last looked for a cross-border car.
There is a limo company out of Buffalo that will drive you to Toronto for about $300 US.
Yep, it’s precisely because of the difficulty with one-way car rentals that many have resorted to renting U-Hauls or taking the limousine service instead. I imagine business must be booming now for the limo company after a rough year.
IMO traveling for the lower efficacy of J&J doesn’t seem worth it to me. Given the fixed costs of travel (flight, testing, crossing back to Canada) and flights / transportation being the highest risk, mattress running for a few weeks between doses for Moderna / Pfizer would be the way to go IMO. Within a mid-June timeline for Canadians to get their first dose of Pfizer / Moderna, the 60-70% efficacy doesn’t seem that desirable to me.
For those who are feeling impatient about the vaccines, I imagine that any vaccine is better than none (for both peace of mind and to be able to do things like international travel), and even if they get a less effective vaccine now they’ll still have the option of getting a more effective one later on.
Agreed on principle, though, a longer stay in the US for the mRNA vaccines wouldn’t be a bad idea if you can make it work.
Agreed completely. In fact I think heading there for a vaccine at this point is quite frankly absurd.
For me- with three kids in school, that may not actually be in the classroom the rest of the year, it kind of makes sense to use the time to take a vacation and get the vaccine.
Totally agreed, indeed absurd.